


this house is falling apart (we’re gonna rattle this ghost town)

by Lunarwolfik



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-18
Updated: 2012-12-18
Packaged: 2017-11-21 12:04:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/597554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lunarwolfik/pseuds/Lunarwolfik
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek hates the Laundromat, hates it with every fiber of his being, but the train station doesn’t have running water and he’s in dire need of clean clothes.  Babying a pack of betas was not exactly easy on his wardrobe choices.  He’s gone through at least five tank tops, shredded beyond repair, and the other three probably won’t even survive the wash, his needle and thread patch-ups having never quite been up to snuff.</p><p>As he’s learned more often than not, just because he hates something, doesn't mean he doesn't have to deal with it.  So, with a huff, he tugs on the duffle full of dirty clothes he’d stashed in the trunk.</p>
            </blockquote>





	this house is falling apart (we’re gonna rattle this ghost town)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kedreeva](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kedreeva/gifts).



> Once upon a time I asked for prompts. Once upon a time [ Kedreeva](http://archiveofourown.org/users/kedreeva) gave me the prompt of Stiles going to the laundromat to wash blood out of his clothes. Once upon a time I did not write weird fluffy angst about werewolves with issues.
> 
> Title inspired by [Anna Sun by Walk the Moon](http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/walkthemoon/annasun.html).

Derek hates the Laundromat, hates it with every fiber of his being, but the train station doesn’t have running water and he’s in dire need of clean clothes. Babying a pack of betas was not exactly easy on his wardrobe choices. He’s gone through at least five tank tops, shredded beyond repair, and the other three probably won’t even survive the wash, his needle and thread patch-ups having never quite been up to snuff.

As he’s learned more often than not, just because he hates something, doesn't mean he doesn't have to deal with it. So, with a huff, he tugs on the duffle full of dirty clothes he’d stashed in the trunk. 

The bag is bursting at the seams, considering he _knew_ he had to face the Laundromat, that didn’t mean he had to do it regularly. The duffle practically has his whole wardrobe crammed inside, minus what he’s wearing and a few surprisingly unscathed shirts and jeans he’d left at the den.

The street’s not too busy, the cars passing bye languidly. The Sunday afternoon sun calling kids into lazy joyrides with their windows rolled down, their music buzzing in his ears with each passer-by. He sniffs, smelling hot asphalt and chapstick, just like every summer he used to spend here. 

Nothing’s changed and yet nothing’s the same. 

Beacon Hills is just like he left it, small-town streets and crowded buildings, ice cream shops with bright red umbrellas crammed between aromatic coffee shops and musty bookstores. Kids strolling innocently on the street, some holding hands, others bouncing to their own beat, not a care in the world. Long-suffering parents ushering small children along, dragging them past toy stores and crying calls for just a few minutes more. The kids snuffling noses and ruddy cheeks grate on his nerves. 

Derek shrugs it off, shoulders his bag, and slams the trunk shut. He didn’t have time to be thinking about that.

The teeny bell rings when he enters Larry’s Laundry and Cleaning. The place isn’t too full, mostly composed of college kids or young couples from the apartment complex a few streets over. The machines whirr along the back, the steady thump-thump of the washing machines a familiar rhythm by now. 

What isn’t familiar is seeing Stiles, boosted on top of a corner washer, roughly scrapping at a shirt. Derek can smell the blood on it from the front, intermingled with the bleach and linen of dryer sheets, but still unmistakable.

He debates leaving, really not up to dealing with the kid, knowing he’s going to have to have stilted conversations in which he doesn’t care and the kid pushes his buttons simply because he can. He’s already a half-step back out the door when Stiles looks up and that’s it, game over. 

The kid’s eyes go round and Derek heaves an inward sigh.

He heads over, ignoring the itch under his skin that says run, and tosses his duffle on top of the machine next to Stiles. He gives him a curt nod, hoping that’ll be enough, but knowing it won’t.

“Fancy seeing you here,” Stiles comments offhandedly, running one hand across the back of his neck.

Derek rolls his eyes. “Lou has the best deals in town. Plus it’s nearby.”

Stiles snorts. “No, I meant outside, in daylight, with other people around. You’re not always the most social puppy.”

There’s the snarking, right on schedule.

“Well, so long as the people aren’t pointing arrows at me, I can be surprisingly social,” Derek replies gruffly, dumping the contents of his bag on top of the machine. It spills everywhere, a couple of shirts and a pair of socks slipping off to the floor, and his favorite pair of jeans somehow making it half way on top of Stiles’ knee. 

Stiles pulls a face and pokes at the jeans, as if they’re contagious, as if touching them is halfway to catching werewolf disease.

Derek rolls his eyes again. “I don’t have werewolf cooties.” He grabs the jeans brusquely though, and throws them into the machine along with the other pairs. Everything else goes into a second machine. He’d never been one for separating the darks and lights. His clothes saw enough dirt and blood that he’d stopped caring long ago.

Stiles scoots a little further away, still gripping the shirt he’d been maligning with bleach tightly.

“Werewolf cooties or no, your stuff stinks dude,” Stiles says back, wrinkling his nose.

Derek ignores him, fishing underneath the machine for the socks that had bounced off. He knows they couldn’t have rolled far.

“If you’re looking for the socks you should just give up now, this place is crawling with sock gnomes. Or house elves, I guess. Either/or.” Stiles shrugs, nodding to a sign on the wall. It read in big letters _Not Responsible For Lost Clothes (Yes, This Means Your Socks Too)_.

“Huh, that’s new,” Derek huffs after a quick glance. He decides it’s a lost cause anyway and stands back up. Twisting a few knobs and throwing in the heavy-duty detergent, he sets the machine running. 

“Yea, guess Lou got tired of all the complaints…”

“It was you, wasn’t it?”

“Only a little bit,” Stiles admits, tentative smile holding too many secrets. Derek gives a derisive snort before letting the conversation drop, running out of words, but more so running out of social niceties. He leans against the machine casually, watching the front of the store, watching the people strolling by. Stiles is blessedly quiet beside him, the thump and whirl of the machines only occasionally interrupted by his grumbles of consternation.

Derek rolls his eyes when the shirt gets flung against the machine across from him, Stiles letting out a stark curse. “Why is blood so fucking hard to get out of clothing,” Stiles bemoans, throwing his hands up in the air in defeat.

“Maybe because you’re doing it wrong?” Derek queries with a raised brow. Stiles scowls.

“Your face is wrong,” he half-mutters. Derek ignores him, picking up the shirt and giving it a once over.

“You let it sit too long for starters, this is at least two weeks old,” Derek sniffs at it, not exactly trying to hide his senses but not doing it in any overt way either. Stiles still pulls a face, and Derek can’t help the flash of displeasure that rumbles in the back of his head. Humans could be so fucking squeamish sometimes.

“Okay, one, ew, you are gross, I don’t even care that awesome wolf noses are cool, that is still-“ he waves a hand in Derek’s direction, as if he couldn’t find the right words before settling on a noise of disgust. “And two, it’s not like I can sneak away to this fine establishment every day, my dad has me on lockdown since the whole stealing Jackson incident. I haven’t seen him around the house this much since…” And this time Stiles trails off, his eyes zoning out. Derek gets a wave of sadness off of him before it’s wiped clean, replaced by a brittle grin and a shrug.

“And your house doesn’t have a washing machine why?” Derek questions, but he’s pretty sure he knows the reason, remembers having to duck into the Laundromat after school all those years ago, shoving clothes into machines in a hurry, trying to rid himself of her smell, her perfume, all of it, knowing the pack wouldn’t approve. Hoping they wouldn’t be able to tell, hoping the chlorine smell would hide it on his skin.

Derek rolls his shoulders, shoving the memories away, burying them deep and focusing on the stupid stained shirt in his hands.

“Dad might find it. Not really up for even more awkward conversations with him. One a lifetime is kinda my limit.”

“You’re going to have to soak it,” Derek replies, verbally sidestepping, shoving the shirt back in Stiles’ direction. “And don’t use hot water. Or hot anything,” he admonishes. Stiles opens his mouth, probably to protest, but nods instead.

“That’s what I thought,” he says, the words short and clipped, clearly not what he wanted to say at all. Derek ignores the opening, lets it drop.

Stiles lowers his head, hands fidgeting with the fabric. “It got mixed up with my regular non-monster-of-the-week clothes somehow. Forgot all about it. That pile’s been pretty low in comparison, y’know?”

“All my clothes are of the ‘monster-of-the-week’ variety, so no, not really.”

Stiles lets out a weak laugh and Derek feels like there’s something he’s not saying, feels it in his bones, remembers being sixteen and having a life ahead of him. Remembers what it was like before, wolf and pack all mixed together with future and hope, with home. Even if Stiles is a human, and doesn’t quite know pack the way he does, Derek realizes he gets it too. 

He gets the feeling that Stiles had lost that hope a long time ago, but has still kept breathing ever since. It makes Derek’s chest ache and his throat taste of ash.

Stiles looks up at him then, his face far too bright, far too open for Derek to bare because this-he doesn’t do _this_. The kid’s smile is crooked and jagged, his breathing normal but his pulse beating it’s own rhythm of fear and panic. 

Derek sighs, quiet.

“It doesn’t get any easier,” he says in measured tones, knowing if he were a better man, he’d pat his knee or tell him everything would be okay. But he knows that’s crap, and he’s pretty sure Stiles knows it too, losing his inner optimist a long time ago.

“Yea-“ he replies, voice rough, a sharp bark of a laugh chasing the sound. “Kinda figured that.”

“But that’s why there’s pack.”

“For you guys, maybe-“

“No.” Derek shifts, feeling an uncomfortable flush trickle down his spine. “Not just- you’re Scott’s pack, Stiles. You know that right?” He looks Stiles in the eye, earnest words the best he can give.

“But I’m just a human,” Stiles replies, mouth down-turned, hope threading its way into the words. Weak and fragile hope. Weak and fragile human.

Derek snorts. “Doesn’t make you any less his.” He pauses, swallowing the lump in his throat. “My pack had humans, before. Cousins and such.” And that’s it, there are more words he could say, names he could list and affectionate smiles he could give, but the words are caught, dead in his chest.

Stiles doesn’t reply for a moment.

“Huh,” he finally says, as if it’s a revelation or a novelty, as if it had honestly never crossed his mind. His fingers drum against his knees then, and suddenly that brightness is back, Stiles’ infallible energy emanating off him like a beacon. “Yea, that makes sense, I mean, recessive genes and all that. And you guys probably don’t always fall for other werewolves, Scott’s a textbook case right there, though he did fall for her before he was a wolf, so that might have something to do with it…”

Derek shakes his head. “We can love as we please. It’s different, with humans, and the bond isn’t the same, but it happens.”

Derek tries very hard not to smell smoke or hear the steady splash of pool water. He mostly succeeds.

“Huh,” Stiles repeats, practically radiating with fascination. Great.

“Do you ever-y’know-turn them?” he asks in an undertone, with flappy hand gestures and all.

Derek shrugs. “Sometimes. Depends. It might be different for those turned.”

“Did you ever-“ Stiles makes another hand-motion, similar to the first.

“No,” Derek says, shutting that avenue down before Stiles can even think to go down it.

“Have you ever wanted-“

Derek doesn’t growl, but he does scowl. Hard. “Personal boundaries, Stilinski, you should look into them,” he grits out through clenched teeth.

“Whoa, whoa, easy, down wolf,” Stiles says, holding his palms up in calming supplication. “Just curious.”

“You know what they say about that.”

“Then it’s a good thing I always land on my feet,” Stiles replies, hopping off of the machine to prove his point. He smirks, clearly pleased with his joke. Derek shakes his head.

“You should really be hoping you got the nine lives part too.”

Stiles waves a hand dismissively. “Pfftt…please, I’m already on my third one by now dude,” Stiles replies flippantly. If Derek hadn’t known better, hadn’t been there for most of those kicking death in the teeth moments, he probably wouldn’t have caught the sharp undertone or the stutter of the boy’s heart.

“Look, my shit’s not gonna be done for awhile-“ he pauses, looking around Derek’s shoulder at the timer on his machine “-and yours is gonna be an even longer while. Soooo…I’m gonna go grab some of that ice cream at Jim’s across the street.”

The invitation is plain enough, if not exactly in words.

Derek knows he should say no, that he should just keep to his routine and not worry about this kid who talks too loud, who moves too much. This kid who also keeps pain and secrets locked away inside like they’re old friends, safe and sound and close enough to not hurt as much. 

Derek doesn’t answer, he doesn’t even know what answer he’d give.

Stiles stares at him for a beat before bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Okay then.”

He’s halfway out the door before Derek starts following him, and Stiles doesn’t even look back before holding the door open behind him. Maybe the optimist hadn’t been beat out of him so much after all.

An hour and two waffle cones later, Derek hears the laundry machine beep across the way. 

He lets it go.


End file.
